Reading Danny Weidler is the sporting equivalent of listening to Kyle Sandilands. You don’t do it to like him, you do it to hate him. Not a week goes by that he doesn’t write something that infuriates.
Usually it’s his update on what Sonny Bill Williams eats for lunch, his love of reporting which player went to a pub on their night off or his inability to decide in which person to write (“my mail is,” “according to this column”, “we can now tell you”).
Nevertheless this week he hit a particularly raw spot which I would ordinarily ignore (if you let Danny Weidler bug you too much, he wins) but it’s such a consistently harped upon point.
Daly Cherry-Evans’ ongoing battle with the Manly Sea Eagles to have his contract upgraded doesn’t bear repeating.
But on Sunday, Weidler had a fresh take on Cherry-Evans’ financial situation.
“We know he is earning $85,000 at present, but on Thursday morning he could not afford to buy a toasted sandwich, and a soft drink from the Sea Eagles canteen was not in his price range. He had to give the canteen an IOU of 15¢,” Weider wrote in The Sun-Herald.
Obviously Cherry-Evans didn’t ask for the story to be printed but what kind of response does Weidler think he’s going to elicit for the young halfback?
Sure $85,000 a year is nothing compared to the reported $550,000 Chris Sandow is said to be on – particularly considering Cherry-Evans has represented his country while Sandow is yet to play any form of representative football.
However, the latest Australian Bureau of Statistics numbers on household incomes said the lowest 20 percent of Australian households average an annual net income of $32,000 per year.
That’s not the lowest 20 percent of the population, that’s the lowest 20 percent of households – meaning at least two people and probably a few dependants – scraping by on less than half what poor Daly has to live off.
Whenever this little chestnut gets brought up, football players are quick to point out that they have a finite career and need to make as much money as possible during it because they’ll be lucky to play past the age of 30.
This is a fair enough argument except that it seems to imply that once they’ve finished playing rugby league they will be incapable of ever earning money again since, instead of earning a trade or a degree, they spent their youth playing football.
However, the salary cap specifically gives exemptions for university and TAFE fees and approved traineeships. In fact, the Toyota Cup operates a “No Work, No Study = No Play” policy on all players in the game’s under-20s competition.
How many jobs will cover your tertiary education as well as pay you a minimum wage of $50,000 a year?
Of course many players won’t take up this option. This doesn’t mean they face a 50 year retirement which they’d want to have saved well for.
Some players finish their time in the game and get a job in coaching, recruitment or possibly even management. Others will gain employment in the media.
However, considering over 400 players participate in the NRL each year, most will not get jobs in the game or the media.
But the game rarely leaves the rest in the lurch completely.
Take Adam Woolnough. After a career in which he played for Newcastle, Penrith and the Melbourne Storm, he retired from the NRL at the end of last season. What’s he up to these days?
He’s returned to Newcastle to play for Lakes United in the real NRL (Newcastle rugby league) which, coincidentally, is the club located closest to Xstrata’s Blakefield South coalmine where Woolnough now has a job.
Quite how ten years as a prop prepares you for life as a coalminer is anyone’s guess. But how it will land you a job is as obvious as the great gaping holes Woolnough will be plying his new trade down.
Connections.
Even a few years playing professional rugby league and you are going to meet some of the highest rollers in the country.
Men the likes of Lachlan Murdoch, Tony Sage and John Howard are known fans of the game, while Russell Crowe, Nathan Tinkler and Nick Politis are directly involved.
If, at the end of a career in which you have met with some of the wealthiest, most influential people in the country, you can’t get a half-decent job, you deserve to flip burgers at MacDonald’s.
This isn’t to say rugby league players don’t deserve the money they’re on. Nor that they don’t deserve more, particularly as the game continues to generate the kind of money it does.
But before they cry poor the players need to remember the lowest paid NRL player is on twice as much as 20 percent of homes out there and that, no matter how short their career may be, life after footy exists.
Most of us just call it life.
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